


Nothing Hard or Bright

by Muccamukk



Category: Band of Brothers (TV 2001)
Genre: Canon Era, Episode: s01e10 Points, Fluffy McFluffface, M/M, Sharing a Bed, Sleeping Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-24
Updated: 2019-12-24
Packaged: 2021-02-18 03:35:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21921130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk
Summary: Babe hadn't thought Gene had stayed.
Relationships: Babe Heffron/Eugene Roe
Comments: 14
Kudos: 79





	Nothing Hard or Bright

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Thrillingdetectivetales for beta reading!
> 
> The title is from a letter home Dick Winters wrote describing the view from a ski lodge above Zell Am See, which he rotated the guys through to give them mini vacations:
>
>> While in the mountains I found a church of my own. The aisle is two mountain ranges down which you can see for 10 miles at least. At the end there’s just a series of mountain peaks. A storm came up and the dark clouds covered everything but the far end, where the sun shone through on those many peaks. The color was all shades of rose, a light, soft rose, nothing hard or bright, but just rays of light coming through the clouds. They were the most beautiful stained glass windows I have ever seen or hope to see. What a wonderful place to pray. What a magnificent church.

_Three days._ That was the first thing Babe thought as he drifted gently awake in the cradle of a real mattress with an honest to God goose down quilt over him. Three blessed days in the mountains above Zell am See with nothing to do except maybe try to learn to ski, or just wander around in the snow. Hell, if he wanted, Babe could just sleep the whole time. Sergeant Randleman had said he didn't care what everyone did.

The bed was so warm, Babe didn't think he'd be getting up any time soon, no matter what. He figured he'd wander down to the ski lodge's big shared kitchen and find some chow, eventually, but that seemed too much to tackle just yet. His nose was cold from poking out under the blankets, and he ducked his head back under and rolled over, careful to stay in the same spot so as not to move out of the pool of warmth he'd built up.

Babe still somehow kneed someone in the ass, someone warm who mumbled unhappily and incoherently. Babe blinked, peering just over the edge of the covers to see the messy black hair poking out, then he blinked again.

He hadn't thought Gene had stayed.

There were enough rooms in the lodge that even with the better half of first platoon up here that no one _had_ to double bunk. They'd drawn straws for the handful of double beds, and Babe had gotten one, a whole room to himself even. Gene had laughed and called him born under a lucky star.

After lights out, Gene had crept into bed with Babe, and they'd held each other, made love with a quiet intensity that had almost stopped Babe's heart, and held each other more. Babe had drifted to sleep, thinking that he'd never been so damn happy, fully expecting Gene to slink back to his own rack, like he usually did.

That was how they'd always done it: coming together for moments of intimacy stolen from the war, then bouncing away from each other. Five months since this whole thing had started in the Belgian snow, and they hadn't actually slept together since that one night in the foxhole after Julian's death.

Babe looked at the top of Gene's hair, the only visible part of him, then followed the line of covers with his eye, watching them rise and fall gently as Gene seemed to drift back into sleep. Gene murmured again, but it was a contented, sleepy sound this time, accompanied by a settling deeper into the covers. He was curled on his side with his back to Babe, not quite on the edge of the bed.

A faint light crept through the curtains, not dawn yet, Babe didn't think, but getting there. Their little mountaintop lodge was still surrounded by snow, even this late in the year, and it made everything seem clean and brilliant. Some of the guys had been joking about snow blindness on the hike up.

Babe edged closer to Gene. If he would just roll over, Babe could see his sleeping face. He'd never done that: watched Gene or any other guy he'd been with sleep. He wanted to wrap his arms around Gene and enjoy the feel of their bodies next to each other. A soft bed and all the time in the world was everything they'd dreamed of on those long-frozen marches. Babe put his hand on Gene's ribs, and felt more than heard him hum in his sleep. Encouraged, Babe slid the rest of the way in, spooning up behind Gene so that their whole bodies lay alongside each other. They were both naked, and the feel of Gene's skin against his brought back memories of the night before: the first time they'd had the luxury of enough time to take all their clothes off. Gene's hair tickled Babe's nose, and his ass felt so good against Babe's crotch that he could have cried for the joy of it. Babe wasn't sure where his other arm should go, so he tucked it awkwardly between his chest and Gene's back, trying not to elbow him in the spine.

"That's nice," Gene murmured, and wiggled back to lie more snugly against Babe.

"Shhh," Babe whispered, and kissed the side of Gene's neck. He watched as Gene's face stilled and relaxed and wondered how much you had to trust a fellow to sleep when he told you to. Jesus, Gene was beautiful. Just looking at his ear and part of his cheek, Babe felt tenderness he couldn't describe ball up in his chest so tight it hurt. Babe tightened his hold on Gene and tried to follow him back into a doze.

It didn't work. Babe was awake now, and all the soft mattresses and warm quilts in the world wouldn't lull him back to sleep. He sighed softly, his breath puffing Gene's hair away from his neck, and tried not to think about the night before, or how good Gene felt to hold. He should let Gene sleep as long as he liked, and not bother him.

Was that why Gene had stayed? Had he just been too tired to crawl back to his own room? Had Gene wanted to stay, or had he simply neglected to leave?

Now that he was thinking of it, Babe had to wonder if, when Gene woke up properly, he'd try to slip out without Babe knowing he'd been there the whole time. A little spark of panic shot through Babe at the thought. It'd only been a few minutes, but he'd already grown so attached to the idea of Gene spending the night with him because he wanted to that the counter argument rattled him. He wanted to keep thinking of this first morning together as special, a sign that they were moving into new territory, maybe even a little taste of what their life together after the war would be like.

Gene had talked about sleepy Saturday mornings with nothing to do but lie in bed and watch the fan blades turn, his voice soft and awed, like he was describing a vision of God he'd once had and might never see again. Babe had told himself at the time—they'd been shoulder to shoulder in a ditch, Babe waiting for first platoon to go over the top into the next Belgian village, Gene waiting for the first man to scream for a medic—that he wanted to share that with Gene more than anything else. Babe had thought that if lying in bed together, warm and safe and without a thing to do, wasn't pure heaven, he didn't know what was.

Babe didn't think he could ask Gene if he'd meant to stay the whole night. If Gene had, it'd come off as petulant, like Babe didn't trust him. If Gene had meant to leave, but had fallen asleep, the question would only embarrass the both of them, and frankly Babe didn't want to know the answer.

It was idiotic to be taking this so much to heart. Babe stared at the back of Gene's neck and told himself it didn't matter.

If Babe pretended to sleep, then he could see what Gene would have done if he'd woken up first.

Unless he had already woken up first, seen Babe, and decided he was happy where he was. It was quite possible Gene had chosen to stay multiple times that night, and Babe was winding himself up over nothing. Even if he hadn't decided to stay, Babe was still winding himself up over nothing, and pretending to sleep when he was making himself more agitated by the minute wasn't going to work anyway. Why couldn't he just enjoy this?

Babe sighed loudly, and Gene stirred again.

He seemed more awake this time, groping for Babe's hand until he could take it and entwine their fingers. "Babe?"

Babe snorted. "Jesus, Gene. You better not be expecting another guy."

Gene hummed again and drew Babe's hand up so that he could kiss the tips of his fingers, then his palm, then the inside of his wrist. Babe thought he might just melt then and there, becoming a puddle on the mattress.

"I don't want to get up," Gene complained.

"You don't have to." Babe kissed a line along Gene's shoulderblade and said between kisses, "You can stay here with me. All day."

"Mmm." Gene was nearly purring, and Babe wondered if they'd move into love making, but before he could reclaim his hand and show Gene the incentives to stay in bed, Gene wriggled out of his arms and rolled out of bed. "Gotta piss though," he said.

Gene stretched luxuriantly, his back arching as he lifted his hands towards the ceiling. His skin was already starting to pale from the cold of the room, but he didn't seem to mind.

"You're beautiful." Babe hadn't meant to say it out loud, but he couldn't keep it in, either.

Gene turned and smiled down at Babe, then leaned in for a good morning kiss. When Babe leaned up a little and opened his mouth, Gene chuckled and curved his hand around the back of Babe's head, holding him steady as they kissed. Gene's lips were soft and full, not chapped from the cold like the first time they'd done this.

"I like waking up in your arms," Gene whispered in Babe's ear.

The relief that flooded through Babe was so overpowering and irrational that he didn't even think as he reached up and caught Gene's wrist, hand tightening on it so he couldn't get away. "I love you," he promised. They'd already said that, but he needed Gene to know just then.

"I know you do, Babe," Gene said. "I love you too."

They'd been in Germany the first time, the battalion anchoring the line, and not really expecting danger or a fight. Babe and Gene had gone for a walk though one of the little town's parks, shoulder to shoulder, but not daring to touch. An elderly German couple had been walking as well. Their hair was gray, their shoulders stooped with age, and their country in the ruins of defeat, but they'd still been holding hands. Gene had leaned in, taking Babe's hand in his, just for a moment, and whispered, "I want to love you like that." Babe hadn't known what to say except, "Me too, Gene." That had been enough.

Now, Gene kissed Babe's fingers before pulling away. He crossed to the window and pulled the curtains open, standing naked in the first light of dawn, seeming to be immune to the cold. In front of him, the window looked out onto the rose-colored snow of the mountaintops, their tips painted gold by the first rays of the sun. The light reflected up and haloed Gene as if he were a saint in a stained glass window.

"I wonder if this is real, sometimes," Gene said, voicing Babe's thoughts. "Sometimes I think I'm still in the Bois Jacques, and this is all a dream."

"Yeah," Babe said. He didn't quite believe that. He didn't think his imagination could have come up with something this good. He tended to dream more of hot chocolate and real food, maybe a warm bed, not a fairyland. "But it's real, Gene."

"I'm glad." Gene turned away from the window, and only then seemed to notice the chill, rubbing his arms briskly. "Cold, too. Stay right where you are, I'll be back."

He vanished out the door towards the latrines down the hall, and Babe settled back into the warmth of the bed. He watched, drowsing, as the sun crested the mountains.

Two more mornings like this, and then, if God and the Airborne spared them, the rest of their lives.


End file.
